


hello, mystery

by notpeterthepanda



Series: black and blue [1]
Category: Phineas and Ferb
Genre: ASL, Human Perry the Platypus (Phineas and Ferb), Light Angst, M/M, Post-Episode: s04e46 Doof 101, Secret Identity, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 13:19:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18250664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notpeterthepanda/pseuds/notpeterthepanda
Summary: Once the school year starts, things change, and set patterns in Danville start breaking down. Facing threats to his identity from all sides, Perry—part-time uncle, part-time secret agent, full-time master of compartmentalization—has to struggle to maintain the carefully-constructed boundaries between Perry Flynn-Fletcher and Agent P.(or: the story arc i can't believe i haven't seen anyone write yet)





	hello, mystery

Perry’s tired.

In his defense, for what little it’s worth, it’s been kinda a long day. Even for him. And he’s used to having to pull all-nighters and wake up at odd hours, seeing how unpredictable his job ends up being, so you wouldn’t really think this would be a problem at this point.

But at the same time, he’d only gotten two hours of sleep last night because of that whole Dr. Bloodpudding thing with the combustible flamingos. And he’d had to keep an eye on the kids today since Linda and Lawrence were out of town most the day for that big antiques and astrophysics convention, which meant he ended up being the one Candace tried busting her brothers to. You can probably guess how well that worked out for her. Then, after that mess finished playing out and their parents got back, OWCA rung him and told him to handle recon on a LOVEMUFFIN meeting downtown, which—wouldn’t know you know it—ended up turning out into a full-on brawl. So he had to run interference on that, too. And then he had to fill out all the paperwork for it, and basically it’s past two in the morning and he’s only just now getting back to the house.

So, yeah. At this point, he’s exhausted, and he feels like he’s got a right to be. It was easier, having a full-time, exclusive nemesis. Now that Heinz’s given up evil and started working as a teacher, OWCA pretty much just assigns Perry to anything they’ve got, makes him do whatever needs doing. It’s kind of a lot.

But he’s gonna be stuck doing this for a while longer. OWCA regulations: after a long-standing nemesisship ends, they like giving the agent a little time to recuperate. Kinda like bereavement leave, minus the time off. Or a remarriage waiting period, maybe. Since there haven’t been any big up-and-coming threats, nothing to merit skipping over it like the Regurgitator, Major Monogram’d given him a month before he’ll get assigned to a new nemesis. Longer than most agents get, but, well. Perry and Doofenshmirtz’d been closer than most nemeses.

Y’know, in retrospect, it’s probably a good thing that that waiting period exists. Sure, his workload might be heavier than he’s used to, but he isn’t sure he could handle being assigned a new nemesis right now.

Anyway. He’s tired, his whole body hurts, and all he wants to do is collapse on his bed and sleep for longer than’s probably medically considered healthy. At least a day straight. Of course, he won’t, because he never sleeps past eight on principle, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to. Preferably starting now.

Except, when he’s sneaking through the hall, making a beeline for his bedroom, he hears noise. Whispering. And it’s coming from the spare room.

Wearily scrubbing a hand over his forehead, he silently resigns himself to having to stay awake a little while longer.

And see, what Perry Flynn-Fletcher wants to do is take the direct route, walk in and ask whoever’s in there just what they think they’re doing. But Perry Flynn-Fletcher’s only a piece of him. He’s also Agent P, one of OWCA’s finest, skilled in combat and espionage, and what Agent P’s been trained to do is listen in and get a feel for the situation first before just running in blind like that. And although he’s meant to be Perry Flynn-Fletcher right now, he’s spent a lot of time being Agent P today.

Ignoring the uncomfortable, vague twist of déjà vu in his chest, he pads on over to the door to the room. Well. Here’s hoping he’s making the right call on this one. Perry heaves a quiet, weary sigh, and presses his ear to the door.

“Seriously, how are we supposed to bust him if the Mysterious Force keeps messing everything up at the last minute like this? Like, it’s almost like this is a sitcom or a cartoon or something, and the writers are conspiring against us in order to preserve the basic formula.” Candace’s voice. Talking about busting her brothers, it sounds like. “Okay, yeah, you’re right. That’s a little far-fetched. The intangible, omnipresent entity makes a lot more sense.”

Come on, can’t she give it a rest? Bad enough that she spends all her free time trying to bust ‘em, but now she’s up and whispering about it at all hours on a school night? There’s no way her mum and dad would’ve okayed her being awake right now, either, making this—as she’d put it—a bust-worthy thing in and of itself.

And yeah, okay. **Maybe** he’s still a bit annoyed from all the time she’d spent dragging him around today, even after he’d specifically told her he wasn’t getting involved in her busting thing. But putting that aside, looking at things objectively, this still definitely isn’t okay.

Who’s she even talking to? She had to have snuck someone else into the house—there’s no one who lives here who would’ve wanted to talk to her about all this, and especially not at this hour—but he’s not hearing another voice. Must be someone with the sense to keep their voice down. Better not be Jeremy Johnson, or else Perry’s really gonna rat the pair of them out to Linda.

“I just don’t get how we’re supposed to do this if the Mysterious Force’s going to get involved,” Candace hisses loudly. Someone really needs to teach her how to whisper. “The cameras stop working for literally no reason, that DNA tracking thingamabob ends up getting hit by a weird ray out of nowhere and turning into a hive of wasps, and now the scanner for the house gets blown up? By a **flamingo**? I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m not actually surprised at this point. After last summer, this barely even registers on my weirdness scale. But seriously, there’s got to be a better way to do this.”

He’s heard enough. Perry straightens.

“You know, this would be a lot easier if we told Phineas.” He freezes, one hand hovering in front of the doorknob. “It’d go a lot faster if we didn’t have to hide it from him,” Perry hears her say. “Like, he could probably help fix up some doohickey to find out where he’s going, or check the house for weirdness or whatever. And that way we could do something to look for clues every day, instead of just every few days around the whole after-homework big and bustable projects you guys always do. It could **be** the big and bustable project. And I wouldn’t even have to bust it! Much. I mean, is there a reason we can’t just… I dunno, tell him what we know?” Her tone’s hesitant, weak. Indicates she isn’t expecting to convince anyone with her argument.

“Because,” Ferb states, sounding thoroughly unconvinced, “if we tell him we think someone close to him is lying to him, he’s bound to take it personally. Given the circumstances, it’s likely Phineas would elect to take a more direct approach to the situation than would perhaps be strategically sound.”

The dim familiarity in his chest’s turned into full-blown recognition, slithered on down to coil up in the pit of his stomach: a heavy, writhing weight. “Yeah,” Candace sighs, clearly unsurprised, “that’s what I thought. He’d totally freak out and start yelling at Uncle Perry.”

Perry’s not entirely sure when he stopped leaning against the door so he could listen in on their conversation and started just using it to hold himself up. But apparently that’s happening now.

Okay.

OWCA regulations firmly stipulate that, in the event that a cover story becomes compromised, the agent in question should be immediately relocated away from their host family in order to preserve the anonymity of the agent and the security of the agency. However, the discussion he’s currently hearing does not suggest that his host family knows of his affiliation with OWCA.  It only indicates that Candace Flynn and Ferb Fletcher currently harbor suspicions that Agent P’s being dishonest about something and are currently investigating the situation in an attempt to determine just what it is. Should he take precautions to avoid them discovering the truth, there’s no reason he’d need to be relocated.

OWCA regulations also firmly stipulate that he should make an official report to his superiors, should he suspect anyone’s starting to catch onto his secret identity. But he knows how Major Monogram would respond to that—immediate relocation, most likely—so, needless to say, **that** isn’t happening. He isn’t leaving this family. Perry’s fought for this, he’s earned the right to be a Flynn-Fletcher, and he isn’t just gonna up and leave them. Not now, not ever.

“What if I told Phineas I thought I heard a family of platypi trapped somewhere in the walls and we needed to find them fast before they ran out of food, and also if he happened to find any secret passageways while he was scanning the house looking for them then like that’d be totally cool too but no pressure?” she’s asking. “No, you’ve got a point. He’d probably catch on with the whole platypus thing. We need to go subtler. Ooh, what about rabbits?”

“Uncle Perry?”

He doesn’t even realize he’s scrambling for cover until he’s already hidden halfway down one of the lair entrance tunnels underneath the floorboards. The one by that one lamp-slash-coat rack Linda’d bought two months before Phineas was born.

Great. And this is one of the older tunnels, too, so it’s got way too sharp of a curve and it’s not even waxed. Good for staying in place, because otherwise he’d have slipped all the way down to the lair by now, but this is definitely gonna be hell on his back later. After waiting a few seconds, Perry clambers back up towards the top of the tunnel, listening as closely as he can. “Huh,” he hears Phineas say. “I guess not. Man, I must be more tired than I thought.” There’s a sound. Knocking. “Hey, Ferb? Are you in there?”

A loud shriek. “Nothing! I, um, I mean—” Oh, jeez. Perry can practically feel the door slam open. How has she not woken Linda or Lawrence up yet? “Hi!” Candace chirps, too-sweetly, and tops it off with a fake giggle. Just to really sell it. “How, uh, I’m here! And Ferb is too, yep, wow, I mean it’s so funny you should ask.” Seriously. Forget the whispering thing: someone needs to teach her how to be subtle in general.

“Okay!” Phineas easily allows, somehow not picking up on the fact she’s hiding something, despite the fact that it’s the least convincing act Perry’s heard in a while. “What are you guys doing out of bed, anyway? Isn’t it a little late to be talking about stuff?”

A beat. “Um… yes. Yes, it is! Gosh, I—pfft, I didn’t even realize how late it was. I mean, can you believe it’s already this late? Why are you both even awake? It’s, like, so past your bedtime.” Outta nowhere, Candace’s voice gets even louder, more assertive.  “Alright, that’s it, move it! Both of you, go to bed right now. No chit-chat, no dragging your feet, no ‘where’s Perry,’ nothing. Just two dweebs going to bed! **Quietly**!”

“Hey, speaking of which. Have you ever noticed that, in the right light, that lamp kinda looks like Perry wearing a fedora?” Whoops. “Or—wait, maybe it’s a coat rack. I can’t actually tell.” Phineas pauses. “No, Ferb, not instead of the fedora, instead of the lamp… although, it would be pretty cool if you could wear a coat rack. Hey, Ferb, I know what we’re going to do tomorrow! Well, technically later today, I guess.”

“What did I literally just say?” she demands. “Enough with the catchphrases already. Hurry up, or you’re busted and I’m telling Mom!” Candace’s voice’s getting quieter and quieter. Although, by the way she’s inflecting what she’s saying, he’s pretty sure that has more to do with proximity than anything else. “Go on, bedtime. For both of you. And also me.” A thunk, then another one: doors closing, sounds like. Presumably the ones to their bedrooms.

Perry waits, gives it a minute. It’s quiet. All clear.

Clambering up the rest of the tube, he eases the floorboard aside as softly as he can manage—don’t wanna make any noise and accidentally tip the kids off that he’s still up—and pushes himself up onto the floor, setting the panel back in place. And then he sits down on the floor, buries his head in his hands, and breathes.

Alright. So, the kids’ve seen something they shouldn’t have.

Or Candace and Ferb have, at least. And yet, strangely, not Phineas? Not sure how that happened, because the boys are glued at the hip most days, but apparently that’s the situation he’s working with here. Still. Just because they’ve seen something out the ordinary, know he’s hiding **something** , doesn’t necessarily mean they know he’s a secret agent. It’s not like they explicitly called him one, or brought up OWCA, or anything. Hopefully that means he’s in the clear there. For now, anyway.

At the same time, they had mentioned trying to scan the house for stuff that shouldn’t be there, planting cameras around the place. So that means they’ve probably seen him using one of the lair entrances, or at the very least, worked out that they exist. Maybe they’ve just noticed that sometimes he’ll walk into rooms and won’t come back out, and they’re trying to figure out why? That’d be nice. Easy to explain, pass off as accidental. A lot of things like that happen in Danville.

Footsteps. “Oh, there you are, Perry.”

He doesn’t have to look up. _Hey_ , he signs shortly, the movement feeling jerky and stiff, letting his hand fall quickly back down to his lap.

“Were you the one making all that racket?” Linda gently asks, sitting down next to him. “You know, it’s funny, but I honestly could have sworn I heard Candace’s voice. I thought she was trying to get the boys in trouble again, or something. Honestly, I’d really hoped she would calm down about all that since the school year started back up, but I guess not. Teenagers, am I right?” A pause. “Rough day today?”

Nod.

She sounds hopeful. “Well, do you want to talk about it?”

Head shake. _No._ His fingers slam together: a beartrap snapping shut.

There’s an awkward pause. After a long minute, Linda’s hand lands lightly on his shoulder. “You know, I bet you’ll feel a lot better after you get some rest,” she suggests kindly. “Everything always looks better in the morning.” Her voice goes wry. “And by morning, I mean that time **after** you sleep. Seeing as it’s after two right now. Which could technically already be considered morning, but it shouldn’t, since no sane person would actually be awake then.”

At that, Perry can’t help but snort. _Sorry to wake you._ Pushing himself up to his feet, he glances her over, forcing a casual, easy smile that isn’t quite coming naturally. _Tripped over that lamp._ Twisting his expression up into something more sardonic, he shrugs. _Apparently, it’s harder making your way around in the dark than you’d think. Gonna have some serious bruises in the morning._ Even with the explanation, she’s watching him, mouth twisted downwards into a thoughtful frown. Great. Well, add Linda to the list of people he’s made suspicious today.

Heinz, OWCA, and now the Flynn-Fletchers. Y’know, sometimes, it feels like everything’s just barely hanging on by a thread. How is Perry supposed to fix all this? He’s got to find a way to glue all the pieces of his life back into place, back where they’re meant to be, but it feels like everything’s falling apart faster than he can put it back together.

Still, he’ll work this out. He always does.

Well, uh. Right after he gets some sleep, that is. If he doesn’t, Linda might actually slip a sedative into his morning coffee.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still in shock that no one's written a fic where the kids start suspecting human!Perry's a secret agent and try to bust him. If anyone sees a fic like that elsewhere, let me know.  
> More of this series coming soon!


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